Home » Academics » Truth Lab

Jeremiah Challenge: Trusting, Praying, Seeking and Finding God's Plan for You

The Question

Most of you are getting really tired of answering the question, "So, what are you going to do after graduation?" When I was a senior at little Ripon College in Wisconsin, back when the TV shows "Dallas" and "Dynasty" were as big as "American Idol" is now, I worked for the admissions office. While giving campus tours to potential students, their parents would often ask me, "So, what are you doing after graduation?" Rather than going into the lengthy explanation of what paths I had been exploring, I would say, "Going home for dinner. After that I'm kind of up in the air." Typically it would catch at least one parent off guard and leave the other one trying to figure out if I was serious or just being funny.

As you approach your college graduation, you're going to hear that question a lot more. Our culture has conditioned us to respond with the "success" lines: "I'm going to graduate. Then law school (or med school or seminary). And I'm going to save the world." But for most of you, your plans aren't so clear.

At the Focus on the Family Institute I deal with a lot of anxious senior students each semester who are under the impression that when they leave school the rest of their life has to be laid out for them. This anxiety comes from an expectation that our society puts on you, even the church sometimes. But God is the one who has the plans for you.

Read It and Weep

Let's talk about Jeremiah. They called him the weeping prophet for a couple reasons. Accounts have it that Jeremiah was one of the most outwardly confrontational prophets of all time. He not only wept, but wanted you to weep over the sorry state of affairs in the culture as well. It is no wonder this guy didn't get invited to many parties.

But here in the middle of this depressing book (29:11-14), are these words of hope.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the Lord ….

Let's look at these verses and see what they have to say about how you should deal with your future.

Trust

"For I know the plans I have for you" — v. 11

Sounds like God wants us to trust Him. Trusting God — what does that look like? I think it means complete and utter surrender of our entire being to God. It's like a ring full of keys. We hand all the keys over to God. However, in our fallen-ness we pull them back one by one. We experience what Oswald Chambers calls the "discipline of dismay." Chambers writes, "At first I was confident that I understood Him but now I am not so sure. I begin to realize there is a distance between Jesus Christ and me. He is ahead of me but he never turns round. I have no idea where He is going, and the goal has become strangely far off."¹

I've experienced this feeling in recent years. In a series of events one semester I felt very distant from God. I described to my wife that it was as if God were sitting across the room from me, and as I pleaded with Him for direction, He sat there, arms crossed, not saying a word. Then in the days, weeks and months that followed I began to realize that all He was waiting for was for me to turn over all the keys, to get up from my seat, and to come to Him. When I did that, those once-crossed arms were flung wide open, and into their safety I ran.

God knows the plans — trust in them.

Pray

"Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me…" — v. 12

What do you long for? What does your heart ache for? Margaret Magdellen, wrote a short work called The Furnace of the Heart in which she explored the language of longing — the core of the Christian being, a heart that reaches out, a heart that cultivates our truest sense of love and longings. In one chapter she addresses the question of how one awakens these longings. She apologizes for what would outwardly appear to be the simplicity of her answer. Her answer is simply communal prayer with God.

Here's a question I ask students each semester and I hope will haunt you as it haunts them: What baffles your mind and breaks your heart? Look deeply within. Ask that question and then listen to the God who has put those things within you. Do you want to know God's plans for you? Unleash the longing of your heart to connect with your mind — and pray.

Seek

"When you seek me with all your heart" — v. 13

Are you seeking God? Are you seeking anything?

Our command as Christians is clear, though: "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well" (Matthew 6:33).

Many of my students have had to suffer through an agonizing array of questions and discussions, the least popular of which is "Why did you get up in the morning?" In a series of follow-up questions, the students and I begin to discover some of their inner motivations for doing something as simple as getting up in the morning and dragging themselves to class.

In my class, it isn't long before someone taps into the thing they seek the most — to serve God. To follow His leading. To trust in His plan. To communicate with Him in prayer. To seek His face every moment, every hour, every day.

Find

"I will be found by you," declares the Lord … — v. 14

As many of us have discovered, God is never far from us. But we must be willing to seek, to pray and to allow our ears to hear, and our eyes to see, the glory and magnificence of God's presence in our lives.

One thought on impacting the world for Christ: In seeking the plans that God has for you, don't always think your impact will be world-changing and enormous. It may very well be that the impact you have is personal and unnoticed.² Remember whose plans you are seeking.

Do Something … Even if It's Small

The year was 1943 and in a small Swiss village the craftsman picked up the order form that the shop's owner had said was "urgent" and to be handled with the "utmost care." Christian Lausen Jr. was the owner. The company was the prestigious (even then) Montblanc Pen Company. The craftsman was a young Jewish immigrant from Germany, named Jozef Grunberg. The order was from one Adolf Hitler.

As Jozef read the order, he saw that he was being asked to craft and engrave a special order Montblanc Meisterstuck pen for Hitler's personal use. Montblanc's owner knew that only his top young craftsman was up to the job.

Jozef's mind was forced into the memories of his own flight from the terror of the Third Reich, and the stories that had flooded out of Germany and Poland about the extermination of the Jewish people. And here he stood with an order to provide a special writing instrument for the man who led them all. This might even be the pen that signed the death warrants for so many of his people.

Jozef battled with the thoughts that went through his head, and the sickness he felt down deep in his stomach. Could he serve Hitler in this way? Would he do this to his people? He was so lucky and got out of the country. Could he betray his family and friends this way?

Then, as if a light went off in his head. Jozef set the order to one side, and began to engrave the most beautiful Swiss mountain on the side of the pen, so that whenever Adolf Hitler or anyone else would look at it, he would wonder at the scene and the craftsmanship. He worked diligently for several days, until the project was done. Then he carefully wrapped the order up and had it shipped to Berlin by the deadline.

Unbeknownst to anyone else, Jozef had added a statement of his own to the pen. On the top of each Montblanc pen is a white star, with soft corners that represents the snow-capped peaks of the Alps. In this special order pen though, Jozef had been able to engrave a gold star of David into the white cap of the pen. Only if the owner were to look down into the pocket where the pen would reside, would he see the symbol of the people he so wished to exterminate.

The story spread quickly around the Jewish world, and even as the Jewish people would see news footage of Adolf Hitler, pen neatly clipped in his upper left hand pocket, they would know the mark he really carried. In that one small gesture some found power and strength to know that someone out there cared about them. That someone knew of their plight and was willing to act.

Jozef Grunberg used the gifts he was given to make an impact. He could never use military might. He would never even use political power. He used a simple mark, on the top of the pen, to support his people in one small way. He made an impact on the world.

For Such a Time As This

C O F F E E  S H O P

---

How do you deal with your fears about the future?

Join the discussion!

If you are going to make an impact on the world, Jeremiah lays a challenge before us of how to seek and follow God's plan for our lives. And just like Esther, your time is now — you are here on the precipice of God's plan for your lives, for such a time as this.

So: why did you get up this morning?

More importantly, why will you get up tomorrow morning?